Video 7:43
Illegal supplement claims rock Aussie Rules

AFL club Essendon will be investigated by the Australian Sports Anti Doping Authority after allegations a banned substance was used by some players with worries held for the league as a whole.

Transcript

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: The American cyclist Lance Armstrong has ensured the issue of drugs in sport is front and centre around the world. And now Australian sport is reeling from its own shock revelations. The Australian Sport Anti Doping Authority, ASADA, is investigating Essendon Football Club for the extensive use of a mysterious performance enhancing supplement by up to 12 players. There's speculation it could be a growth hormone known as GHRP6, a substance banned internationally. In a moment we'll hear from a doctor who is an expert in hormones and sports nutrition who was approached by Essendon personnel. But first Greg Hoy examines what could be a major crisis in Australian sport.

GREG HOY, PRESENTER: How did football come to this? Not since the year 2000 has the Essendon Football Club known as the Bombers tasted victory in the AFL premiership under then captain James Hird. Last season was not just another disappointment for the 140 year old club and its now coach, James Hird. It was with hindsight, a disaster, given the revelation around a dozen players in the team may have extensive used - via syringes and other means - an unidentified performance enhancing substance, and that the Australian sports and drug administration is now investigating.

JAMES HIRD, ESSENDON COACH: I believe we followed processes, we've put in place the right sort of processes. My understanding is that we worked within the framework that was given to us by the AFL and by WADA, and I'm shocked to be sitting here really.

GREG HOY: The stakes for Essendon are sky high.

GERARD WHATELEY, ABC AND FOX SPORTS: The stakes are huge for Essendon and they're huge for the players involved. Now regardless of whether they claim they didn't know what was in the supplements they were being given, that's no defence and hasn't been a defence for more than a decade. That level of subservience actually staggers me as it's being put forward. And for Essendon the short term future of the club is at stake.

GREG HOY: Former greats of the game are baying for the AFL's blood.

RON BARASSI, AFL HALL OF FAME LEGEND: These people in charge of our game - not their game, our game, all of us are in this - they should have seen this long ago and done something about it. It's obvious that this is what's going to happen because we haven't been tough enough on something that's really foul in its thinking, that because you've got big money, or because you've got a great doctor, you win a sporting match. Come on! I mean to me that is ridiculous thinking.

GERARD WHATELEY: It's a huge issue for the AFL, it's the biggest issues that any sporting organisation around the world can deal with match fixing and performance enhancing drugs. Mainly because it goes to the believability of your sport. As we've seen through the Lance Armstrong example that cycling was a lie through that period of time, all that goes with that. The AFL hasn't really had to deal with performance enhancing drugs certainly outside of an individual case. Now it's got maybe clumsy, maybe orchestrated, something that it doesn't understand yet, it does not know where this investigation will take it, but the feeling is it will take it to dark places.

GREG HOY: Indeed the problems are mounting for the AFL. It appears the league was specifically warned last year: Essendon had inquired about the use of so called "peptides" with speculation rife today that this may refer to the growth stimulant GHRP6, which is a banned substance under the World Anti Doping Agency's code.

CHRIS EASTON, AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY: There are a broad range of function of peptides and so where they're administered, they address, they enhance growth, they enhance tissue repair, they help overcome pain, and there's also hormones that are simply known as "feel good" hormones.

PETER LARKINS, SPORTS PHYSICIAN: Growth hormone or growth hormone stimulators or peptide stimulators have been talked about in many sports for a number of years as a very hard to detect product, but also something that will give the effect of anabolic steroids which are traditionally used but are much easier detected. So really it's about strength and muscle gain.

GREG HOY: The Bombers' choice of slogan for the 2013 season is proving increasingly uncomfortable.

FOOTBALL AD: Do whatever it takes.

GREG HOY: As for those supposedly responsible, last night Essendon stood down fitness trainer Dean Robertson pending the investigation, having already parted company with physiologist Stephen Dank, who formerly worked with Manly and other Sydney Rugby League clubs. The two had more recently been consultants to the Geelong and Gold Coast AFL clubs.

GERARD WHATELEY: I find it very hard to believe within an AFL club at the moment that there could be a renegade element within the fitness staff that was operating outside of the football department, outside of the head coach, outside of the chief executive. Now perhaps people didn't know the specifics, but they should have and did know enough to have alarm bells raised. That's why there was a waiver for the players. The club wanted indemnity from the possible consequences of this course of action and I think that speaks volumes.

GREG HOY: There are so many questions to answer. The winner of last year's Brownlow Medal for best player in the AFL was the Bombers' Jobe Watson. It's unknown if Watson will be drawn into this scandal, and if so, if his award will stand.

GERARD WHATELEY: In the end that's going to be a black and white verdict as to what was involved here. If there's nothing then Watson will go through this awful period of speculation. If there's something then the Brownlow Medal would be revoked.

GREG HOY: Today the Bombers trained under tight security in Melbourne. It must be emphasised there's still no confirmation of exactly what drug the players used last year and if it is indeed illegal. But legal or not, if it does turn out to be a growth hormone substance, sports scientists urge great caution by those tempted to use such drugs.

CHRIS EASTON: If you're taking a growth hormone, for example, it stimulates growth that's unnatural growth. It could also stimulate a cancer, for example, that's already pre-existing but otherwise dormant. If you have a feel good hormone it basically helps you overcome the pain barrier and we suffer pain for a reason, to tell us something's wrong. So if you push through the pain barrier as a result of a chemical treatment there's always a risk that the damage to the body will be much worse.

RON BARRASI: It doesn't matter who goes down, in my opinion. That's individually and collectively so if it's the famous team or the bottom team or the famous player or the struggling player, I'm sorry, but we've got to put out the message very early in the piece, you don't do it this way.

LEIGH SALES: And we should stipulate it's not yet known if any player, including Jobe Watson, has taken these supplements.